Look back at historical flood

You may have heard enough about flooding. In which case, switch to another story now. But, I’m grateful to Abby Miller for who has found a book on Google that talks about even more horrendous floods in this part of Scotland in 1829.

The book “An Account of the Great Floods of August 1829” talks about the floods that were caused by a series of spectacular thunderstorms in the region.

One passage refers to boat rescues in Kintore:

“At Kintore, where the environs are flat, a number of people were taken out of their houses, at the upper windows, by means of boats. At Dyce, the roads were so flooded on both sides of the river, that it was impossible to cross by the bridge…”

Elsewhere it talks about how the river Ury and Don joined up before the Bass in the cemetery in Inverury (sic) and how people at the time thought this was alluded to in Thomas-a-Rhymer’s prophet:

“The Dee and Don shall run in one,The Tweed shall run to Tay, And the bonny Water of UryShall bear the Bass away.”

The first part, people of the time thought, had been fulfilled by the formation of the Aberdeenshire Canal which ran from the Dee to Port Elphinstone. (It was never financially viable and the canal was sold to the railway company and filled in to make the railway line, but remnants remain at Port Elphinstone. The Port Elphinstone name itself is a reminder of the ambitions of the canal company.)

The bass, of course survived the inundation. But the tombstones that surround it were not as fortunate.

“…this churchyard was completely covered, the tops of two or three of the tallest tombstones only being visible; and one of these frail memorials of the dead, was actually carried off by the force of the stream, and deposited on the haugh grounds below Kintore, a distance of four or five miles down the river!”